The air raid sirens have barely stopped sounding across Ukraine this week, and Volodymyr Zelensky is already on a plane to Turkey with a very specific shopping list.
The Ukrainian president is set to press Nato allies at their Istanbul meeting for additional interceptor missiles, making the case that his country’s existing air defence network simply can’t keep pace with the volume of Russian strikes. It’s a conversation Ukraine has been having with the West for over two years now, but the urgency has sharpened considerably.
Recent Russian attacks have been among the most intense of the entire war. Drone and missile barrages have targeted Kyiv and other major cities in waves designed to overwhelm the Patriot and NASAMS systems Ukraine already has deployed. Each interceptor fired costs money and depletes a stockpile that isn’t being replenished quickly enough.
Zelensky has been blunt about what he wants: more interceptor missiles, faster delivery, and fewer conditions attached. His argument is straightforward. You can’t defend a country with an air defence system that runs dry.
The numbers tell a grim story. Ukraine currently operates a patchwork of Western and Soviet-era systems, but analysts tracking the conflict have noted that Russian forces have adapted their tactics, launching larger, more coordinated salvoes specifically to exhaust the available interceptors before the real payload arrives.
Nato members are sympathetic, at least publicly. But sympathy doesn’t shoot down a Shahed drone. The alliance’s collective stockpiles of compatible interceptor missiles are themselves under strain, with several member states having drawn down reserves to support Ukraine over the past two years.
The Turkey summit represents a chance for Zelensky to apply direct pressure in person, something he’s proved effective at doing. His wartime diplomacy has a track record of producing results that seemed unlikely beforehand, from tanks to F-16s to long-range missiles.
Whether he can unlock a significant new tranche of interceptors before Russian strikes intensify further this summer is, for millions of Ukrainian civilians, rather more than just a diplomatic question.
